


never leave here

by jenwryn



Category: S.C.I.谜案集 | S.C.I. Mystery (TV)
Genre: Biting, Cooking, Feelings Realization, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Moving In Together, Wall Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-10
Updated: 2020-07-10
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:48:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25176403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenwryn/pseuds/jenwryn
Summary: It's not Zhan Yao's kitchen; it's Bai Yutong's.
Relationships: Bai Yutong/Zhan Yao
Comments: 18
Kudos: 209





	never leave here

**Author's Note:**

  * For [siluria](https://archiveofourown.org/users/siluria/gifts).



> Written for the prompt "Bai Yutong realising he's accidentally on purpose moved into Zhan Yao's apartment". This was originally intended for [Multifandom Drabble 2020](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/multifandomdrabble2020) but... well, words happened. Thank you to K. for looking this over for me, though I know I've changed a lot since then! Title from 'Adrenaline' by Matt Nathanson.

It’s not his things in the bathroom— the scattering of products, constantly muddled in amongst Zhan Yao’s, no matter how many times he organises them into two distinct corners; marshalling tubes and tubs like an army major trying, and failing, to keep two fraternising platoons apart. It’s not his things in the bedroom, either— half of his clothes squeezed into a wardrobe that is not his, and his favourite blanket, a gift from his grandma, folded neatly across the end of the bed. It’s not even the fact that most of his dumbbells have migrated into the space beneath Zhan Yao’s couch. 

It’s the kitchen that does it. 

He’s opening a cupboard door to make dinner — the request, “Chicken would be nice,” having floated from the couch, entirely unprompted; Zhan Yao hasn’t even bothered to lift his face from the laptop he’s grading essays on, has just tracked the sound of him moving around the apartment. He’s opening a cupboard door, then, to get out the high-sided pan he likes best for the chicken dish he now has in mind, when he has the sudden realisation that the cupboard is just… fully stocked, and perfectly tidy. Everything is here, and everything is exactly how he likes it; all his pots and pans and trays, so carefully selected since he’d first begun to teach himself to cook, put neatly into place.

He blinks at them, hand frozen on the open door. 

He takes a look around him. 

There— that’s one of the tea towels he’d bought, after having discovered there _weren’t any here_. And that’s his favourite trivet, a gift from his sister. Those are his good measuring scales: precise, and forbidden for non-kitchen use. His knives are here, too; the lousy selection that Zhan Yao had owned for who knows what reason — stabbing burglars to death extremely slowly and bluntly, probably, since that’s about all they would have been good for — have long since been stashed in a box at the back of the pantry. 

It’s all of his kitchen things. They’re all here.

He’s having a sudden and visceral reaction, too, to the abrupt certainty that he knows, for sure, that he can, of course, cook the chicken that Zhan Yao has requested, because he knows exactly what’s in the fridge. He’s the one who buys the groceries. He’s the one who runs a mental tally of what’s ready to use, what’s been prepared on the weekend; what else he needs to purchase so to always have things on hand that Zhan Yao will like to eat. 

This is not Zhan Yao’s kitchen. 

It’s Bai Yutong’s. 

It’s _Bai Yutong’s_ and— _he lives here now_. 

“Oh,” he says, out loud and slightly startled. He sets his good pan to the counter with considerably more of a clatter than usual and finds that he needs to take a damn minute. 

He’s still having some kind of mild palpitations — very quietly, of course! It’s not like he goes around having panic attacks or something — when he feels the light touch of a hand upon his shoulder. 

Zhan Yao has come into the kitchen, and is watching him, when Bai Yutong turns his head to see. 

No, scratch that: he’s not watching him. He’s observing him. 

The problem with Zhan Yao, though, is that — even with his infuriating ‘observation’ face on — he looks so fucking soft in his at-home clothes. The man’s wearing a silly fuzzy sweater, and kitten slippers, and his hair isn’t quite sitting right. 

Bai Yutong thinks, warmly, and absolutely not for the first time, how fucking _huggable_ he is like this. 

He lets his gaze slide across Zhan Yao’s expression — takes in his familiar pretty mouth and his familiar dark eyes — and realises, not with much surprise all now, context-considered, that his customarily lingering perusal of Zhan Yao’s features should probably be picked up, mentally, and placed in a new category in his mind, because _oh_ , and also, _oh shit_. 

Zhan Yao is looking, in this moment, exactly like he wants to say _Just worked it out, did you?_ He’s somehow, quite valiantly, holding it in. 

Bai Yutong decides that he’ll appreciate the effort.

The thing is, he’s not — he’s not averse to having worked this out. Not at all. He’s had boyfriends before, he’s had lovers, but, still, all that aside, this is— this is _Zhan Yao_ , and he’s gone and _moved in with him_ without even realising? 

Moved in with him, and would also like, very much, to kiss that too-knowing look right off his clever face.

“Were you planning on saying something eventually?” he asks, after having taken his minute.

He gets the rice rinsed and into the cooker, and takes the chicken out of the fridge to warm up a little— it’s already chopped; he likes to meal prep on the weekends, while he watches Zhan Yao nap on the couch and— yeah, okay, _okay_ , he hasn’t been at his brightest with this.

He puts the pan on to heat, and adds a little sesame oil. 

Zhan Yao is still just standing there. Is still just observing him, obnoxiously aware. 

Bai Yutong really does resent that expression, whenever it’s directed at him, and he also really, really _would_ like to kiss it away. This is a definite fact, now: has gone from uncertain to absolute, in the time it has taken him to gather a handful of ingredients from the fridge and to hip-push the door shut behind him and, alright, yes; he’s learning a lot about himself tonight.

Zhan Yao is probably feeling very pleased inside that over-thinking, too-observing brain of his. 

As if he hasn’t just had his world shaken down, Bai Yutong peels and prepares garlic, ginger, and spring onions; steady-handed and clean knife-work.

Zhan Yao doesn’t offer to help, but that’s fine— they’d done that dance in the first few weeks he’d cooked here: it’s not actually helping if you don’t know how to peel a vegetable, or where your own damn rice cooker is stored. The man has one eyebrow raised, though, and there’s a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. 

Bai Yutong has already finished slicing the ginger when Zhan Yao finally responds, so textbook calm as to be almost a tease, “I mean… would you have listened to me if I had said something?”

He concedes that one in silence, and focuses on sautéing the ginger and garlic instead. He can’t help himself for long, though, and waves the spoon in Zhan Yao’s general direction; says, “You don’t need to be so smug about it.”

“You love me when I’m smug,” retorts Zhan Yao, and it ought to sound like a sentence with a mistake in it — ought to sound like he meant to say _you love_ it _when I’m smug_ — but the intention is clear and bold on his face when Bai Yutong looks.

Bai Yutong just keeps on looking, and then thinks, _that too, okay; that too_. He turns back to the cupboards and gets out his rice wine, gets out his soy sauce, the bottles clinking together in his hand. 

He certainly refuses to acknowledge the fact that Zhan Yao is laughing fondly at him. 

Zhan Yao is still smiling, when the ginger and garlic smell just right.

Bai Yutong drops in the spring onions and the chicken; cooks them to golden, before stirring in the rice wine, and the soy sauce, and some rock sugar. The ingredients, played out in order in his mind, let him set his world back to rights: a new world, with far more feelings than he had expected, sure; but set to rights, nonetheless. 

The rice cooker, behind him, has begun puffing out steam. 

He’s at home, in his kitchen, and he’s happy. 

Of all the breakthroughs he’s ever had, this is up there with the best of them.

Zhan Yao begins to move away — back to the couch, probably — back to his grading. Flicking the stove’s heat to low, Bai Yutong reaches out and grabs him; stops him from going. He holds him in place and just looks at him some more, until he finds what he wants in his expression and then pulls at him, harder, drags him around; manhandles him in a half-circle until he’s got him pressed up against the fridge with a thud. 

“It’s a bit rude,” he drawls, pushing into Zhan Yao’s personal space, one hand splayed on the fridge beside the man’s head, “that you let me move in without us discussing it. Is there anything else we should be talking about?”

The chicken is making bubbling noises in its sauce, and the rice cooker is hissing, and Zhan Yao is just _looking at him_ , all soft eyes and stupid fuzzy sweater, his expression so openly affectionate that Bai Yutong’s breathing hitches. 

After a few, long seconds, though, the expression tightens. Zhan Yao says, “This?”, and pushes himself off of the fridge, and against Bai Yutong’s chest. 

Bai Yutong, for all his greater muscle mass, has to step backwards at the sudden force of it; has to put a hand out and brace himself against the counter, even as Zhan Yao reaches up to grip at his jaw and tug their mouths together. Zhan Yao kisses like fire, all tart lips and biting teeth. It’s not what Bai Yutong had expected, if he’s thought about it (he has thought about it, but only in a vague kind of way, only in a lazily wanking after a weekend sleep-in kind of way, back when he had slept in his own, emptier, bed). He likes it. He likes the heat of it, likes the sharpness; likes the way that Zhan Yao snarls his fingers into his hair; likes the way he presses his thumb against the back of his head to draw him in, deeper, closer. 

There is a demand wound up in it, though, a declaration, and Bai Yutong feels weak beneath the weight of it, unsteadied, even as he meets the kiss with equal heat; even as he rocks his whole body into it. 

Time passes — mouths and hands and _Zhan Yao_ — until the rice cooker audibly clunks from cooking to warming, and he finally remembers that he’s in the middle of making dinner and that — going off of the rice cooker — the chicken must have been simmering for almost long enough.

He pulls back, breath slightly short, and rests his forehead against Zhan Yao’s. “Do you want to make out,” he asks, after a moment, “or do you want to have dinner?”

Zhan Yao, when he steps backwards and out of Bai Yutong’s arms, is gratifyingly rumpled. His already imperfect hair is now thoroughly and delightfully disordered, and his cheeks have warm colour in them. 

Bai Yutong takes it all in, and feels extremely pleased with himself. 

“I’ll have my dinner, and then I’ll have you,” Zhan Yao responds — startlingly — easy as 1-2-3 — and wanders back around to the couch, where he puts his laptop on his knees and, so far as Bai Yutong can see, returns calmly to grading. 

“ _You_ …” he mutters, aggravated. He gives up on this fight, though, and stirs the chicken with a determined outer-calm. The sauce has, thankfully, not stuck, and he’s glad he’d had the presence of mind to turn the heat down. He tastes a piece — almost ready — and quickly gets out some greens to steam (which he knows that Zhan Yao will look peevishly at, because the man cannot adult), and then some wine (which he knows that Zhan Yao will look pleased about, since he’d ordered it in specially for him after a throw-away comment two weeks earlier).

They eat dinner, Bai Yutong flipping through his social media absent-mindedly, since Zhan Yao has brought his laptop — with its clearly time-sensitive grading — to the table with him. The almost-silence is comfortable: the sound of chopsticks on ceramic; the slight clink of glass against timber; the familiar ticks and creaks of the apartment around them. It could be any other night, any other dinner, if it weren’t for the low pull of tension between them. 

He finishes his meal — puts more vegetables in Zhan Yao’s bowl, adds more chicken — but he’d made his own serving small on purpose, and he tells Zhan Yao to keep on eating as he tidies up the kitchen. He washes things by hand, soapy water swishing as he works, and he tries, very, very hard, to work out when it was that _feelings_ had even come into play. 

He’s dated, of course, but it had never felt like this. He’d even moved in with a boy, extremely briefly, during college, but that hadn’t felt like this, either. He’s happy, here, with their dinners and their conversations; with him working out while Zhan Yao reads; with Zhan Yao stretched across him, napping, as he watches a movie. The thing is, now he’s understood that he has feelings for the man, that he can’t remember when they had actually begun. The bubbles in the sink are insisting, as they reflect his face — warped and curved — back up at him, that the reason for that might be the most obvious one: he can’t remember when he fell in love with Zhan Yao, because he’s always been in love with him.

The idea sits far more comfortably than he might have expected.

Drying his hands, he goes back to the table, and gently pulls Zhan Yao’s laptop away from him. Says, voice pitched low, “You made some noise about having me…?”

Zhan Yao leans back in his chair; a clearly intentional and controlled sprawl. He raises both of his eyebrows, provokingly. 

They don’t get as far as the bedroom. 

They stop, twice, before they even get across the room— once against the table, once against the back of the couch. Their mouths are hot against each other; they taste of wine and of dinner. Zhan Yao’s kissing isn’t quite as sharp now, as though he’s lost a little of his bite over their meal, but it’s good, it’s _good_. Bai Yutong pushes his hands beneath his sweater, palming the skin that he’s seen so many times before, but never when so acutely aware of how much he wants it.

Their third stop, rough and grabby, is up against the lounge-room wall. He pushes Zhan Yao against it, like he had pushed him against the fridge. He thinks about how fucking good Zhan Yao looks; how good he looks with his lips swollen with kisses, and his skin flushed, and with Bai Yutong’s big hands pushing his sweater higher, baring his stomach, one thumb against the dark line of hair trailing temptingly downwards.

He must take a few too many seconds to admire the sight, because Zhan Yao opens his mouth to talk, an expression on his face that says he’s about to be _clever._

Bai Yutong cuts that off at the pass by pushing him back even harder, their chests pressed together, and one of his hands on the wall beside Zhan Yao’s head. Their positions really are like those from the fridge now, and he braces himself to be pushed away. 

Zhan Yao defies his expectations — probably on purpose — and softens against him, instead; lets their bodies fit seamlessly together; lets Bai Yutong slide a knee up between his thighs. In fact, not only does Zhan Yao allow it, but he steps his feet apart, spreads his legs wider, so that Bai Yutong can press his knee even higher, and it’s Bai Yutong who moans at that, Bai Yutong who tucks his face down into the slope of Zhan Yao’s neck, momentarily overwhelmed, and bites down. 

Zhan Yao jerks like he’s been electrocuted. His shout, however; high and needy, cannot be misinterpreted as having been caused by anything but pleasure.

Bai Yutong grins widely against his neck. He sucks at the same place, tongue stroking the skin, and then bites down again, this time a little harder.

Fingernails scrape against his scalp, and Zhan Yao’s hips buck against his rocking knee. The man is hard enough to feel it, now; hard enough to feel the weight of arousal against Bai Yutong’s leg, and Bai Yutong presses closer; wants to see him squirm from it.

“Again,” orders Zhan Yao. He tips his head to one side, making more room for Bai Yutong’s face, for Bai Yutong’s mouth; making more room for anything but doubt as to what it is that he’s asking for.

Delighted, Bai Yutong licks along Zhan Yao’s neck. Zhan Yao isn’t fragile, not really, but he always seems somewhat delicate when compared to Bai Yutong— more slender, more in his own head; softer, gentler. He thinks about how well Zhan Yao will bruise and obligingly worries skin beneath his mouth; works his teeth intently, and his tongue; hard, then soft. He bites down lightly, then firmly, peppering satisfying little marks against Zhan Yao’s skin, and testing the limits of what pain he likes.

“You’ll have to wear a turtleneck tomorrow,” Bai Yutong says, breathing out across a blossoming bruise. “Unless you want everyone to know that we’ve been fucking.”

He feels possessive at the thought of it; smug and pleased.

Zhan Yao’s whole body shudders at the words. His hands, up until now, have been exploring beneath Bai Yutong’s shirt — have been stroking along his back, fingertips digging in at each bite, and then flexing out at each lick — but they work their way free, now; move back up to Bai Yutong’s head. Zhan Yao winds his fingers in his hair and _tugs_ , right on the edge of mean. Says, in an almost dangerous tone, “You’re promising fucking but, Bai Sir, I’m not seeing any.”

It is Bai Yutong’s turn to shiver. He repositions himself, burns the expression on Zhan Yao’s face into his memory, and then says, smoothly, “I know you’re trying to goad me, Professor Zhan.”

And he does know, truly, how often he’s pushed or manoeuvred into doing things, but he can’t really bring himself to mind. This is Zhan Yao, and they’re on the same team. Is it even goading, anyway, if you’re being pushed to do something that you were already planning on doing? 

Hands moving fast now, he helps Zhan Yao pull his stupid fuzzy sweater over his head, and his t-shirt, too. He bite-kisses his way down Zhan Yao’s chest, smoothing his hands in the wake of his mouth as he goes — kiss and nip, stroke and touch — enjoying the strangled little sounds that Zhan Yao keeps making. By the time he reaches dick, Bai Yutong is on his knees. He nuzzles his face against the bulge in Zhan Yao’s lounge pants, enjoying the extra heat through the cloth; relishing the especially obscene noise that Zhan Yao makes in response. He has no doubt that his own dick, were he to look down, would be clearly visible beneath the thin material of his track pants, but he is far more interested in looking up; and so he does, a question clear on his face.

“Another time,” says Zhan Yao, after a considerable amount of staring down at him, and after his cheeks have, gratifyingly, flushed further. “I want—“ he pauses, unusually, just for a moment, and wets his lips. “I want the both of us to feel good, not just me.”

Bai Yutong _would_ feel good, without a doubt; could probably come just from that, just from going down on Zhan Yao, can feel himself straining at the mere thought of sucking him off— but now’s not the time for an argument. He yanks Zhan Yao’s pants down, instead, no mercy to the man’s erection, and finds, delighted, that he isn’t wearing any underwear. 

“ _Nice_ ,” he says, deeply satisfied, and he’s talking about the dick as much as about the going-commando. It is not, after all, as though he’s properly looked before, no matter if they’ve been naked in front of each other plenty. He is very much looking now, though, and he can’t help but press his mouth to it — the dick is just there, for fuck’s sake, and it’s pretty, and it’s Zhan Yao’s — no matter what Zhan Yao had said; he plies it with open-mouthed kisses, licks at the head, and then drags his mouth along the length of it, flat-tongued and captivated.

The sight of Zhan Yao — when Bai Yutong looks up again, one hand resting lightly against the man’s erection — the sight of him, with his head flung back against the wall, eyes closed, mouth open, is not one he’s going to forget any time soon. Tipping his own head back down, he bites, gently but intently, into the soft skin of Zhan Yao’s inner thigh. 

Zhan Yao yelps but his dick jerks, hot and eager, against the loose confines of Bai Yutong’s hand.

Extremely pleased with himself, he gets back to his feet, undresses, and then rests his hands, firm and broad and steady, against Zhan Yao’s waist. 

Zhan Yao, slightly dazed-looking, makes a startled noise when Bai Yutong lifts him. His back is dragged against the lounge-room wall, and Bai Yutong shifts his hands, slowly, from his waist to beneath his butt, to better hold him in place.

“Wrap your legs around me,” he says, and leans back in, clearly angling for a kiss.

There is a moment where he thinks Zhan Yao is going to _argue_ with him; where he thinks that Zhan Yao is going to protest about being lifted, about being hoisted up so easily. Eventually, though, Zhan Yao sighs — like he’s being terribly put-upon — relaxes back against the wall, his mouth on Bai Yutong’s, and wraps his legs around him.

The movement slides their dicks together; blunt heat and insistent hardness.

He can’t help but feel victorious; can’t help the joy that rolls through him, the intense satisfaction. It doesn’t matter if his conscious self has only just recognised that he wants this; his body is clearly singing a much older tune and, besides: he’s Bai Yutong, and he acts once he’s worked something out.

And this? This is single-handedly the best thing he’s worked out in a long time. Possibly ever.

He doesn’t think he’ll ever get over the sight of Zhan Yao up against a wall; the sight of Zhan Yao pressed there and moaning. If anything, he just wants to find a dozen more surfaces to push him up against.

Still—

“If you want to fuck,” he says hoarsely, in between kissing; in between rocking their hips together, “we’re going to need to move to the bedroom.”

“Mmm,” agrees Zhan Yao, and sucks on Bai Yutong’s lower lip. He doesn’t make a move, though; just grinds harder against him; just wraps his left arm around Bai Yutong’s shoulder, to hold himself up a little better.

Bai Yutong grips tighter at his arse. He angles their bodies, too, so that Zhan Yao has more room, when he sees him reaching between them. It’s his turn to sound utterly filthy, now, and the noise that slips from him is exactly that, as Zhan Yao’s hand encircles both of their dicks— as Zhan Yao drags his grasp up along the two of them, tight and warm, and then back down again.

Carrying his weight isn’t such a big deal, especially when supported against the wall — Bai Yutong has the strength for it — but the feel of his dick being stroked and pulled — stroked and pulled by Zhan Yao — stroked and pulled _against_ Zhan Yao — is making his legs tremble.

He shifts his hands to Zhan Yao’s hips, getting better purchase, and focusses on kissing him — close and sloppy, deep and wet — kissing for what feels like forever; touches his tongue to the roof of Zhan Yao’s mouth and delights in the moans he is pulling from him. The thrust of his hips into Zhan Yao’s hand is losing its rhythm, is getting uneven, is growing wild and sharp. They’re braced against the wall increasingly awkwardly, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care about anything so long as Zhan Yao doesn’t stop touching him— and he comes — grunting, gasping — pulsing over Zhan Yao’s moving hand, and crying out against Zhan Yao’s mouth.

“Xiao Yutong,” Zhan Yao breathes, and his lips turn sweeter still, mouthing against Bai Yutong’s face, even as Bai Yutong grips at his hips harder; tight enough to bruise, tight enough to leave marks.

“Xiao Yutong,” Zhan Yao says again.

At the sound of his name, _his name like that_ , Bai Yutong jerks his head and bites down into the soft flesh of Zhan Yao’s shoulder.

Hand lurching, body shaking, Zhan Yao comes between them.

The apartment falls silent.

They hover there, against the wall; Bai Yutong’s hands dug into Zhan Yao’s hips, his face still pressed against Zhan Yao’s shoulder.

Zhan Yao brings his hand up to rest, damply, against Bai Yutong’s back, and then threads his fingers together; his arms loose but warm around Bai Yutong’s neck. It’s a gentle embrace, soft and comforting.

Bai Yutong’s legs have gone weak, like he’s worked-out for too long. He moves Zhan Yao down the wall and leans in against him, abruptly shocked into quiet by the enormity of it all. He lets Zhan Yao do the holding now; keeps his face tucked gently, where he’d bitten so hard before. It feels good, to be held like this. It feels right, to have Zhan Yao’s hands stroking his back, his arms, his shoulders; to have kisses at his hair, and whispered words that make his chest ache.

They clean each other up, after. They move around one another — move with each other — in the small bathroom, as if they’ve always done more there, together, than just brush their teeth. It’s comfortable. It’s as easy as breathing. It’s staggeringly relaxed. 

Bai Yutong washes Zhan Yao’s back beneath the shower spray — soothes the marks he has left on his skin with warm water, with careful touches — and thinks: _home, home, home._


End file.
